Labor Day Weekend greetings, CharterFolk.
The CharterFolk growth story continues. This is the first post going out to a readership of more than 12,000. That’s 20 times larger than when we started a little over four years ago.
Welcome to all our NewFolk!
You will see here that I often use personal experiences to help illuminate something happening in CharterLand. Sometimes it takes pieces in unexpected directions. Today’s is such a piece. I hope you’ll stick with me.
A Once-In-A-Lifetime Experience
It starts with a subject that I’ve never mentioned here before which is my obsession with Bob Dylan. It’s an infatuation whose origins I trace back to the good fortune I had to spend the summer between my sophomore and junior years at Oxford. A friend of mine had brought me a brochure from the study abroad office. I mentioned it to an English professor. He told me that the program was one where Christopher Ricks taught a class. Ricks, my professor asserted, was one of the two greatest living literary critics in the world …
… and, if I applied and got into his class, he thought the opportunity could turn out to be a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
And so it did.
Knees to Knees
There were twelve of us in the class, eleven who hardly even knew who Christopher Ricks was, and myself. Our grades were entirely based on two essays. His protocol called for one-on-one meetings to discuss them.
A week after submitting my first, I entered the little living room-type space where class was held. Two chairs were set before the fireplace. We sat facing one another. He pulled up so close our knees touched. And then he handed me my paper, which I could see was marked up in red.
Please read it to me.
Read it to you? You mean …
Yes, the whole thing. Start at the beginning.
And so I ended up, knees to knees, reading one of my own essays to one of the greatest critics of writing in the world.
I hardly made it to the second sentence before he stopped me to elaborate on a comment he had written in the margin. His critique spanned a wide host of faults in writing, but his recurring focus was my tendency to put clumsy, repetitive and completely unnecessary concluding sentences at the ends of paragraphs.
You see? he said the first time.
Isn’t that sad? the second.
By the fourth or the fifth he was ready to make his general point:
So, if you don’t mind me asking, what do you think it is about you that makes you want to destroy an otherwise promising piece of writing with such inert statements strewn so carelessly about?
I stammered.
Do you mind if I offer my hypothesis?
My guess is that you had teachers in high school who taught you how to produce a three key-term essay, and you pride yourself on being a good student. Am I on to something here?
Silence.
The question is not whether you’re a good student. That has been previously established.
The question is whether you aspire to remain some generator of three key terms, or whether you aspire to become a great writer.
Great writing, I admit, seems an aspiration perpetually out of reach, but to whatever extent I have made it even a step in that direction, I would attribute it to what entered my psyche via Christopher Ricks’s knees.
The Two Great Contributions of the United States to World Culture
The class was on Eliot. One morning we came to his great lines in the Waste Land.
A crowd flowed across London Bridge, so many.
I had not thought death had undone so many.
Ricks wanted to make a point about how the unexpected repetition of words, rather than the conclusion of a rhyme, made the ends of certain lines stand out in importance.
His encyclopedic knowledge of literature went on display, quoting verbatim the unexpected repetition of “the crown” in Richard III as revealing the extent of his lust for power.
Then came examples from Keats, Tennyson and Milton.
Apparently, he didn’t think it was sinking in enough. So he turned to a reference he thought might resonate with Yankees, as he called us.
Dylan.
Whom he then again quoted verbatim, this time from The Lonesome Death of Hattie Caroll …
… Dylan’s recounting of a historical event illustrative of 1960s-era American racism.
Hattie Carroll was a maid of the kitchen
She was 51 years old and gave birth to 10 children
Who carried the dishes and took out the garbage
And never sat once at the head of the table
And didn’t even talk to the people at the table
Who just cleaned up all the food from the table
The repetition of “the table,” Ricks pointed out, emphasized the monotony of the servitude that was Hattie Carroll’s life before she was bludgeoned to death by a drunken White man who eventually walked scott-free.
Oh, you don’t know it? Ricks asked referring to the song.
12 Yankees shook their heads.
Isn’t that sad, he said, shaking his own.
At some point you will recognize. The two great contributions of the United States to world culture are Jack Daniels and Bob Dylan.
The Nobel Prize – Changing World Definitions
For the entire eight weeks, Dylan references were sprinkled into nearly every lecture. I wasn’t at that time much of a Dylan fan. But the fact that Ricks was so adamant in his opinion of Dylan’s greatness stuck with me. And years later, my interest took root. Eventually an obsession set in.
Simultaneously, much as his lectures germinated something new in me, so too did Ricks set about to germinate something new in world opinion. In the beginning, the quest was simply to elevate Dylan to the ranks of the world’s most respected writers.
Then he set his sights on convincing the absolutely most influential that a narrow definition of great literature – only written word, not sung lyrics – was misguided.
Ultimately, in 2016, he prevailed.
For years, Christopher Ricks, English professor and poetry anthologist, was a lone voice proposing the radical notion that Bob Dylan was a poet whose lines were as worthy of the same critical attention and nuanced exposition as he brought to bear on the Odes of John Keats. Ricks stuck to his guns to a chorus of hoots from the professional poetry elite, the English professors and poet-tasters of the wider literary world. This week’s announcement that Bob Dylan has won the Nobel Prize for Literature will drive that derision to a crescendo. But Christopher Ricks has been vindicated by the Swedish Academy’s enlightened decision. Bob Dylan is a poet.
It was an astonishing accomplishment, not just sparking worldwide appreciation for a single literary figure, but a re-understanding of what, in fact. great literature even is.
The Sun’s Not Yellow, it’s Chicken
Most of Dylan’s work has little applicability to our work. But some resonates so deeply it feels written specifically for us.
Take this stanza from Tombstone Blues:
John the Baptist, after torturing a thief
Looks up at his hero, the Commander-in-Chief
Saying, “Tell me, great hero, but please, make it brief
Is there a hole for me to get sick in?”
The Commander-in-Chief answers him while chasing a fly
Saying, “Death to all those who would whimper and cry”
And dropping a barbell, he points to the sky
Saying, “The sun’s not yellow, it’s chicken”
Now, I have no idea whether Ricks would agree with my interpretation of this passage. But my take is that it’s about the risk we face in the presence of commanders-in-chief, in whatever realm, who have excessive power. Not only does their by-fiat level of control afford them the luxury to make assertions that are clearly nonsensical – that the sun is not yellow – but it allows them to take the discussion into the patently absurd – it’s chicken. And in presenting themselves as having had the courage to call other entities that pose no real threat “chicken,” they achieve a level of aggrandizement that only further solidifies their hold on power.
Three Key Terms – Public Education’s Not Yellow, It’s Chicken
You won’t be surprised to hear, CharterFolk, that I see barbell-dropping commanders-in-chief all over public education.
Term One
Look at this story this week from the New York Times.
It’s about teacher unions spending inordinate time, money and effort on their positioning relative to the war in Gaza.
The comments section below the article says it all. NYT readers, many of whom reside far left on the political spectrum, wonder what the heck a union that is supposed to be representing the interests of teachers is doing pontificating on foreign policy.
It’s the natural reaction many people have when they see teacher unions assert their own work is not education, but chicken.
In the same way that Dylan’s commander-in-chief attempts to solidify his position of power by daring to call an actually not threatening force a coward, so too does the AFT’s positioning on Gaza have nothing to do with anything other than bolstering its own position of power. They sense that virtue-signaling on Gaza will resonate with young progressives and will build bridges to politicians with whom they want to ally. So, despite the fact that their work has nothing to do with Gaza, they drop a barbell and strike a public posture designed to fortify their position of control.
It’s what happens in education when commanders-in-chief like the AFT and NEA have such unquestioned authority. The discussion, which is supposed to be about completely different things, veers off into the patently absurd.
Term Two
Montana in recent months points to even more “not yellow, it’s chicken.”
This is a state that hasn’t ever had a viable charter school law. But charter schools are clearly popular with the electorate. So last year, not one, but two bills passed.
One was a true charter school bill.
The second was a charter-in-name-only bill. Under that one, school districts would be the only entities able to open so-called charter schools and would be given financial incentives to do so. Essentially, the second bill is just a giveaway to school districts to create new schools that would deceive the public into thinking that true charter schools are opening.
Predictably, the Establishment sued to block the true charter bill.
It’s now gummed up the process for creating schools that would be true charters.
In the interim, district schools are applying in massive numbers to get their fake charters started.
In fact, when true charter supporters within state government tried to slow down the districts’ ruse, what did status quo interests do?
They sued to force the state to allow the districts to open the so-called charter schools more quickly.
Got that, CharterFolk?
Protectors of the Establishment actually sued to allow more charter schools to open, and won.
It shows the complete and utter duplicitousness of Establishment opposition to charter schools.
Charter schools that are going to be true charter schools? Sue to stop them.
Charter schools that are going to be nothing other than district schools and are going to confuse parents such that it will be much more difficult for true charters to ever take hold? Sue to make them happen as quickly as possible.
It’s what occurs when education’s commanders-in-chief are endowed with excessive power.
They get to make utterly nonsensical assertions, like charter schools are not public unless the Establishment itself gets to be the only entity that can operate them, in which case they’re as public as anything else. And before that head-spinning contradiction can even be deconstructed, they take the conversation into the realm of the patently absurd. For what’s more unhinged than seeing status quo interests sue in order to accelerate the growth of charter schools?
It’s a perfect summary, CharterFolk, of the Establishment’s overarching strategy to undermine our movement:
Charter schools aren’t public. They’re chicken.
Term Three
I’ll offer one more, this one coming from St. Louis.
This week the NAACP filed a complaint against public officials overseeing education being provided to Black students in St. Louis.
Given the tragedy that the St. Louis school district has become …
… it’s a helpful gesture.
The “not yellow” part?
The NAACP lumping in charter schools with district schools as somehow not doing right by Black students.
This happens despite the fact that multiple studies …
… have shown that St. Louis charter schools are generating much higher levels of learning for Black students than district schools are.
The NAACP, as we all know, is an entity that has been John the Baptist to the NEA/AFT commander-in-chief. And because of their long history of convoluted positioning on charter schools …
… when the moment finally arrives to call out the status quo, what do they do but lump charter schools in with the yellow.
It’s a posture that leaves the NAACP in search of a hole to get sick in.
Knees to Knees on Public Education
But you know what, CharterFolk?
In the end, I don’t blame chicken-ness on the NAACP.
Or on Montana Establishment protectors.
Or even on the NEA and AFT, as perfectly poultry as their impact so often turns out to be.
No, I blame it on us.
CharterFolk, let’s pull up a couple chairs before the fireplace, shall we?
The question is not whether we are a good reform effort. That has been previously established.
The question is whether we are going to stay within the narrow confines of the predictable, or are we going to step into the realm of greatness that is within our potential?
Because, clearly, as amazing as the progress is that we have made over the years, there is a part of what we have done – certainly our uninspiring policy agenda of late being one example – that we would have to admit reads like the most pedestrian of three key-term essays.
Such that, what other recognition should be passing between us knees to knees right now than:
Isn’t that sad?
Our path toward becoming, not a producer of three-key term minutia, but the great writer of education’s future starts with us becoming willing to contest the absurd proclamations of the commanders-in-chief who assert that the sun is not yellow.
Who assert that public education is not this thing or is not that thing in ways that always align with their own narrow self- interest.
And who, from there, take the discussion into the patently absurd.
Our task is to more forcefully say that in fact the sun is yellow.
It is to emphatically make our assertion about what public education actually is.
It’s having a North Star that we can all work toward proudly such that when some monopoly-preserver wants to start talking about chickens we can cut them off and keep the discussion where it needs to be.
Which is on the fact that our nation’s public schools aren’t nearly good enough or nearly fair enough, and it’s holding us all back. And it’s absolutely within our potential to do something about it if we just get our acts together.
The Noblest of Prizes – Resetting Understanding
It’s a problem, as I have been writing about in recent weeks that plagues not just our country, but nearly all countries across the globe.
Meaning that, should we actually advance a societal solution that proves viable, it would place the United States charter school movement right up there next to Jack Daniels and Bob Dylan.
Among the most important contributions to world culture our country has ever made
It lays out well the task before us.
A quest for the noblest of prizes.
Just as one voice working for decades ultimately reset the global understanding of what defines great literature, our task is to become a collective voice that works together for decades to reset the global understanding of what defines great public education.